I really love finding out how all the different parts of the Rock, Punk and Metal spectrum mix together. I love hearing something like a Pantera song and knowing which part comes from where, and how it would sound totally different without such and such an album.

I also really enjoy reading lists and countdowns of things like The 100 Best Metal Albums Of All Time, 100 Rock Albums You Must Own, The Most Influential Rock Albums In History, 200 Metal Albums You Must Hear Before You Die, The Greatest Heavy Metal Bands Ever, and so on; as well as any Documentary Film or TV Show on or related to the genre, such as Heavy Metal Louder Than Life, The Decline Of Western Civilization, American Hardcore, Such Hawks Such Hounds, Until The Light Takes Us, Global Metal, Metal Evolution, Heavy:The Story Of Metal and so on.

What?

The following is a list of 1000 (Originally 50, 100, 250 and 500 but it kind of snowballed) studio albums from various genres and sub-genres that constantly appear in such lists, countdowns and top-one-hundreds, that a metal fan would arguably need to have heard or at least know about in order to claim to have a full and comprehensive understanding of metal.

Why was that album included?

The majority are either genre-defining albums, genre-starting albums or hugely influential albums that inspired hundreds of other bands. They either developed the artistic or commercial legitimacy of the nebulous meta-world of Metal or are in-part responsible for either its credibility or popularity.

I’ve tried to keep repetition to a minimum, however if an artist has multiple entries on this list there could be a number of reasons; They might display clear influence to disparate groups across each included release, or else all of the included albums by one singular artist may individually feature perpetually covered or copied tracks, or tracks that are often featured on genre compilation cds and radio/music-tv programming…

Or the artists with multiple releases may either showcase exploration into significantly different musical territory across the separate releases that got included or else showcase historically significant line-up changes, technological advances or artistic trends (eg. the albums were important in creation, popularization or revival of things like concept albums, blast beats, synthesizers, lyrical trends or necro-production etc).

Or of course, it could just be the case where the band were on an unstoppable run of brilliant albums, and all of the albums together are considered a must-have period of the band. Sometimes there’s just no arguing with an unstoppable run of classics.

Some of the albums may have you scratching your head as to they they were included here. There are usually one of two reasons for this. Firstly; Metal didn’t just start one day perfectly formed and unarguably Metal. It came together in fits and starts, things hinted at being Metal for years before any band wrote an entire Metal album. Bands would have one metal song, or even just one metal riff, or even simply an attitude that would inspire future metal musicians of one subgenre or another.

Secondly; Metal is a constantly changing and evolving form of music that both takes from other genres to become diverse and gets taken by other genres as well. Some albums by Metal bands sound nothing like traditional Metal and some albums by Punk, Rock, Blues, Pop, Hip-Hop, Electronic or Jazz bands can include a lot of influences from Metal. The more that you hear, the more you understand where the boundaries are and where the boundaries aren’t. The more you hear that isn’t close to a boundary, the more definitively you understand both what the center is like and how that center relates to things that are far out on the borderline of no longer being Metal. Basically, if you listen to every album on this list, you’ll know what you are talking about when it comes to Metal. You’ll know what an artist is doing and where it came from, you’ll understand more clearly how all the different pieces of the puzzle fit together.

I Don’t Like This List…

To be honest, it is literally impossible for one person to ever understand everything about Metal fully, you’d have to hear every album, demo or riff made in a garage by every musician, ever, since the dawn of time. Not all the albums here even are metal, but hearing them will broaden your understanding of what metal in its entirety actually is.

…and before that puts you on the defensive, for clarity I’d like to state this: I’m not saying that if you haven’t listened to all of these that you know nothing about Metal, only that you don’t know everything about Metal. The main gist of the list is that Metal comes in all shapes and sizes.

The composition of the list is roughly as follows:

The Different Types Of Metal – 73%

The Rock Music That Got Us To Metal – 17%

The Punk Music That Got Us To Metal – 8%

The Alternative Music That Changed Metal – 2%

Sure, there’s some Pop Punk and Rap in there to demonstrate how bands like A Day To Remember mix Pop Punk sounds with Metal sounds, or how Black Sabbath and others added Rap in the 90s/00s. Don’t let that “get your back up” but don’t forget there’s over 60 Black Metal related albums and around 90 Death Metal related albums.

If you still wonder why an album is included in this list then listen to it and find out why! You may not enjoy every album that you hear, but you will understand Metal more completely with each one that you do hear, which of course is the reason for the list in the first place. Its an important moment in every Metal fan’s journey when they finally accept that Metal isn’t just the bits of Metal they enjoy and that things aren’t “not Metal” just because you don’t like them or understand them.

If you disagree with a subgenre’s existence (eg. “Classic Rock” or “Hair Metal”), or an artist’s designated sub-genre in this list (Eg. Why is Mortis alongside Black Metal artists?), try not to get too bogged down in that head-space. While some subgenre categorizations are a matter of fact (ie. Nirvana are definitely not Black Metal and Dragonforce are definitely not Hardcore Punk) its important to remember that subgenres are initially awkwardly built around groups of bands who kind of sound a bit alike, live a bit close to eachother or have one non-musical commonality between them and sometimes its not until years later that bands notice a subgenre exists and specifically try to play within that subgenre. For this reason some people disagree over whether Alice In Chains or Pearl Jam are Grunge or not.

Secondly subgenres are a matter of consensus. If enough informed and reasonable people agree upon something then it exists, even if you disagree just because you don’t enjoy it. Maybe it didn’t definitely exist when it first started getting mentioned, but over time enough bands started sounding that way and identifying as that subgenre and suddenly it does exist.

Thirdly, the lines between some subgenres are blurred and often bands are creative and diverse enough to fit into a subgenre on some songs, or parts of songs, but not others. For this reason some people disagree over whether Metal Church and Anvil are Thrash or not. At the end of the day, if more people associate a band with a particular subgenre or scene than don’t, and a lot of their music sounds like that subgenre, then arguing is going to be a waste of time.

If you have a suggestion for an album that this list is missing out on then feel free to send me a comment, I’m always interested in learning more.

Now; With all that explanation out of the way, keep a positive attitude and an open mind, and please enjoy this fan-made and non-for-profit, labour-of-love list of 1,000 albums that will help you understand Metal, or at least serve to give newcomers a starting-point with some recommendations:

David Bowie - The Rise And Fall Of Ziggy Stardust And The Spiders From Mars, 1972, Glam-Rock, UK

***

This music was important in the development of Metal, some of the most influential work on the first generation of Metal musicians came from this period. Many of these albums influenced or made careers for the journalists, producers, A&R men, equipment manufacturers and fans that directly and indirectly allowed Metal to develop in the way that it did . They helped to cement and legitimize the rock genre which would later spin off into the Psychedelic, Progressive Rock, Hard Rock and eventually Heavy Metal Rock-subgenres.

In addition to the fans at the time, such as Motörhead’s Lemmy or Led Zeppelin’s Jimmy Page, many musicians from later periods as diverse as AC/DC, Guns N Roses, Yes, Heart, Mountain, Soundgarden, Nirvana, Journey, Spineshank, Entombed, Clutch and Monster Magnet would take influence or cover songs from this pre-metal world. Due to its reputation and the media perpetuation of its quality and importance, fans from every generation will look back to this music and find inspiration.

This era of music has caused a definitive and long-lasting ripple effect on every subsequent generation of musicians. Bands both trying to sound like this, and trying not to sound like this have had direct and indirect impacts on the moulding and changing of various subgenres. Where would Grunge, Glam or Prog be without David Bowie?

Vocal styles, production techniques, equipment, and lyrical approaches from this era are constantly being used, emulated, revived (well, slightly differently or ironically), forgotten about or deliberately ignored and all this has a constant wave effect on the ongoing history of Rock music and its offspring Punk and Metal.

The Psychedelic movement’s importance on the world of Metal can be felt even today. Psychedelic lyrical themes including drug taking, insanity and dark fantasy have cropped up ever since their first popularization in the sixties and there is scarcely one subgenre which doesn’t have at least one band that takes the music in a Psychedelic direction. The popularity of this genre gave Progressive Rock a start, directly and indirectly, as fans of Psychedelic bands who started their own bands ended up playing Progressive Rock and also as Psychedelic bands taking things to the next level would themselves become Progressive Rock.

It also resulted in some of the first instances of screaming vocals, heavily distorted guitars and aggressively attacked drumkits (although the Jazz world had a hell of a lot of influence there too), which would go on to have a profound effect on the development of Metal and inspire musicians who liked this new sound to refine it and make whole songs or albums from these Metal-esque moments by Psychedelic bands.

The influence of Psychedelic music can also be found in a lot of Stoner Rock and Metal music, with a lot of effects loops, album covers and reverb choices being directly influenced by old 60s bands. Early Monster Magnet owes a huge debt to the Psychedelic Scene for example, as indeed does Kylesa. Compare them to the more straight forward Fu Manchu and Black Tusk from each of their respective scenes and see what a difference a Psychedelic influence makes even when you play everything else similarly. Even certain Black Metal bands take influence from psychadelic music of this era.

As well as having an obvious impact on the later movements like first-wave Progressive Metal; Progressive Rock, which was as much an attitude as an actual genre, had an impact on thousands of bands from all subsequent eras and scenes who wanted to take things in complex, sophisticated or artistic directions. It had an effect on the keyboard players who would play in certain Hair Metal and Power Metal bands, it had an effect on Black Metal musicians like Ishan who wanted to create grand orchestral work and it had an effect on many guitarists who would take inspiration from the unusual and difficult ways that Prog bands chose to play them.

Even the development and popularization of instruments like the Chapman Stick had a direct impact and influence on bands like Scale The Summit.

Furthermore; as with what happened with Psychedelic music, Prog bands experimented with all sorts of sounds, and tracks like King Crimson’s ‘Larks Tongues In Aspic Part 2′ and Genesis’ ‘Dancing With The Moonlit Knight,’ as well as ELP’s ‘Knife Edge,’ Van Der Graaf Generator’s ‘Arrow’ and Jethro Tull’s ‘Aqualung’ contained some of the heaviest music ever written at the time. Flower Travelin Band were particularly metallic. The first Genesis album had drumming on it that actually resembles the Blast Beat and their fourth album contains some of the earliest recorded examples of guitar tapping.

The development of the rock opera and concept album had an influence on Progressive Metal bands as well as other bands who later would write concept albums without identifying as being Progressive bands, including Fear Factory and Marilyn Manson.

Two of Metal’s most important and influential bands ever; Iron Maiden and Judas Priest became inspired to play because of Prog bands, and some of their early work shares sonic similarities with the likes of Rush (Maiden’s ‘Prodigal Son,’ Saxon’s ‘Rainbow Theme’) and Pink Floyd (Priest’s ‘Run Of The Mill’). The guitar influence of Wishbone Ash similarly cannot be overstated.

Numerous musicians, including Ozzy Osbourne, Forbidden and Between The Buried And Me have covered King Crimson. Iron Maiden as well as the Alternative/Stoner band Clutch and the Hair Metal band W.A.S.P have covered Jethro Tull, Mushroomhead have covered Pink Floyd and Extreme Metal band Opeth took a large influence from Camel to the point where their track ‘Benighted’ bares an almost cover-like resemblance to Camel’s ‘Never Let Go.’

Uriah Heap have been covered by Gamma Ray and W.A.S.P.

The popularity and perceived extremes of Prog also paved the way for the reactionary simple and honest music of Punk. Without Prog there would be no reason for much Punk music to have been made and also a less valid chance of it gaining the same level of popularity that it did.

Furthermore, the non-muscial influence of Progressive Rock on Metal is again noteworthy. Progressive Rock musicians such as Gentle Giant’s Derick Shulman went on to form or work for important Record Labels in the history and development of Metal.

The ‘Classic’ and Hard Rock world is arguably the most direct and important period in the development of Heavy Metal, it was for the heavier moments in these band’s repertoires that the phrase Heavy Metal even became popularized in the first place, and a large proportion of people still call these bands Heavy Metal bands today, even if it is actually only part of their overall sound (they would often dedicate over half their albums to Folk or Blues or Progressive Rock songs).

Thrash bands like Nuclear Assault and Megadeth covered Led Zeppelin, and so do the unique Progressive band Tool. Anthrax, Megadeth, Death Angel and many others from the world of Thrash covered Kiss, as well as bands as diverse as Nirvana (even if sarcastically), Robot Lords Of Tokyo, Skid Row etc

Deep Purple’s In Rock was spectacularly heavy for its time and their track ‘Smoke On The Water’ from Machine Head is one of the most famous guitar riffs of all time, it has been performed live by Rainbow, Gillan and even Black Sabbath. The song has been covered by Power Metal band Metallium, the Thrash band Sepultura and even by Iron Maiden.

The work of these bands is a constant feature in guitar magazines, lists of most-important-albums, Guitar Hero games, film soundtracks, covers played in pubs by unsigned bands and is also a permanent fixture on classic rock radio.

Southern Rock has an impact on Metal in several ways. Firstly, the success of Lynyrd Skynyrd and their influence on guitarists is equal to that of bands like Queen, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple and Black Sabbath. Secondly, the genre’s impact can be felt in the world of Sludge Metal, where bands like Acid Bath, Baroness, Black Tusk and others owe a large part of their sound to their Southern roots.

Pantera and the bands that Pantera inspired owe a large part of their sound to the Southern Rock movement, and bands like Drive By Truckers, Blackstone Cherry and Halfway To Gone mix contemporary music with Southern Rock to create their own sounds. Anyone who have their music described as southern-fried in magazines (even the Nu Metal band Soil) often owes part of their sound to the southern scene.

Its impact can also be felt in unexpected sources, such as Coheed And Cambria (who have covered ZZ Top and made known their love of Gov’t Mule) and Metallica (who have covered Lynyrd Skynyrd) as well as Corrosion Of Conformity’s and Ozzy Osbourne’s guitarists Pepper Keenan and Zack Wylde, who took strong musical influence from it.

The first wave of very hard rock and actual Heavy Metal’s influence on Metal should be obvious. As with Classic Rock, a great deal of what Metal is was defined by this period and this is responsible for so much of the vocal styles, lyrical themes, guitar and drum techniques and the favoured production styles and tonal choices of almost every subsequent generation of Metal musicians.

This is the absolute foundation of Metal. Make this music faster and it becomes Speed Metal, make it both faster and heavier and it becomes Thrash Metal, add a lot of harmonies and melody and it can become Power Metal or Glam Metal depending on how you handle it. Add extra instruments to it and it can become Folk Metal or Symphonic Metal, and moving away from its sound or structure into other musical territories can result in Prog Metal or Nu Metal depending on how its handled. Rapping or Yodeling? Dj Scratches or Fiddles?

Stoner bands have covered Blue Öyster Cult, Metalcore bands have covered Dio, bands from Anthrax to Fozzy to Dream Theater have taken inspiration from Journey and Testament have covered Scorpions.

Black Sabbath are credited with the invention of Heavy Metal, their influence can be felt all over the Rock, Punk and Metal spectrum, and with individual tracks the band have even spawned entire subgenres. For example ‘Symptom Of The Universe’ contains all the key ingredients for Thrash Metal and it was covered by the Thrash Band Sepultura (as well as the Stoner band Orange Goblin and the Alternative Metal band Helmet).

Furthermore the trio of ‘Sweet Leaf,’ ‘Electric Funeral’ and ‘Into The Void’ collectively contain the key ingredients to the Stoner sound and the Doom sound, and have been resemble-to-the-point-of-covered by Sleep as well actually covered by the Stoner bands Kyuss, Monster Magnet & Orange Goblin, as well as the the Groove Metal band Pantera, the Thrash bands Sacred Reich and Exhorder, the Nu Metal band Godsmack, the Alternative/Grunge/Sludge band The Melvins, the Power Metal band Iced Earth and even Ugly Kid Joe)

If you want to be pedantic you could even argue that ‘Supertzar’ almost planted the seeds for Symphonic Metal, after a fashion.

A lot of the early work of Hair Metal bands, such as ‘Burn In Hell’ by Twisted Sister, or Dokken’s ‘Bullets To Spare’ was very similar to traditional Heavy Metal; before the more keyboard, ballad and production-job focused wave of Glam Bands became popular. This may go some way to explain why the earlier bands got called Metal, while the later bands got called Glam, Gypsy Rock or other related terms. Many members of the American public often confuse the most accessible pop-side of the Glam movement with all Metal, which explains why Grunge and Prog musicians mistook Metal as a simplistic genre for so long.

While some Metal purists may overlook the entire genre because of what hit-obsessed record company executives turned the genre into when bands mixed Glam with Pop music, its important to remember that there are songs by bands like W.A.S.P and even Ratt that sound almost indistinguishable from traditional Heavy Metal in the tradition of Sabbath, Priest and Maiden (If you haven’t heard any such Metallic Hair Metal, click here). Even when they weren’t that heavy, they were often at a level of heaviness similar to 70s Hard Rock acts like Areosmith and Kiss.

The commercial impact of Hair Metal drew numerous new fans into becoming Rock and even Metal fans, and had an impact on existing bands who took elements of the Hair Metal sound into their own sound. Judas Priest famously took influence from Hair Metal lyrical themes and synth sounds to a massive hysterical critical and fan backlash and Rainbow, Def Leppard and Whitesnake all incorporated parts of it.

Conversely, In reaction to the melodic and poppier sound of Hair Metal, many Metal bands (especially Thrash bands) were inspired to become even faster, heavier and darker than they already were.

Furthermore, like Prog’s impact on Punk, Hair Metal’s popularity and perceived excess also had a direct impact on the formation and popularity of the reactionary Grunge and Stoner Rock genres (two sides of the return-to-Classic-Rock-and-Metal’s-Spirit idea, which saw bands back-pedalling away from Hair Metal and starting bands with a sound and spirit more akin to the Zeppelins and Sabbaths of the 70s).

Hair Metal bands were influenced from a variety of different sources. AC/DC, David Bowie, The Rolling Stones, Aerosmith, Alice Cooper and Queen seem to be the most prevalent, although Pop, Prog Rock and Southern Rock bands also crept in there.

Even though a vocal minority of purists would like to delete the Hair Metal chapter from Metal’s History, it is there, and it did influence everything which came after it in one way or another. For an example of the influence of Hair Metal; the music of Mötley Crüe has been covered by bands as diverse as Refused, Cataract, Between The Buried And Me, Six Feet Under, Fozzy, Static X and Holywood Undead, and the music of Twisted Sister has been covered by Dimmu Borgir, Anthrax, Six Feet Under, Vision Of Disorder, Cradle Of Filth, Nashville Pussy, Fozzy and Hammerfall.

W.A.S.P songs have been covered by Children Of Bodom, Nightwish & Fozzy. Shadows Fall have covered Dangerous Toys. Whitesnake have been covered by Jorn, Static X and Tarja. Lita Ford has been covered by Device and Reel Big Fish. Enuff Z’Nuff have been covered by The Wildhearts.

NWOBHM and other Heavy Metal from the same time by non-British bands was incredibly important in the development of Thrash Metal, Power Metal and even Black and Death Metal. Some bands, like Motörhead and Iron Maiden became some of the most important, influential and iconic bands in the history of Metal, but some like Diamond Head, Angel Witch and Tygers Of Pan Tang are more famous today for their influence on bands like Metallica. Bands like Angel Witch and especially Venom were particularly influential on Thrash Metal and later various Extreme Metal styles.

Some music by bands like Tygers Of Pan Tang and Saxon can sound more like Thin Lizzy than Metallica so its always interesting to listen to the broad and diverse Spectrum of NWOBHM bands. Just as the basis of bands in the Grunge movement varied from Punk to Hardcore to Noise to Classic Rock to Heavy Metal to Hair Metal, often two NWOBHM artists would sounds vastly different, one with a softer Rock sound, one more Progressive Rock influenced, and another sounding almost like Thrash, Black or Power Metal at times.

In recent years there has come to be a New Wave Of Traditional Heavy Metal sub-subgenre in which artist seek to replicate the sound, spirit and ideals of this era of music (more so than Stoner Rock and Power Metal already did in their own ways). Bands like White Wizzard, Cauldron, Enforcer, Holy Grail, Wolf, Ram, Steelwing and countless others can fall into this category. However since the time has passed, there is often little to distinguish some artists from fitting into another subgenre such as Stoner Metal (in the case of The Sword, Blood Ceremony and Grand Magus) Folk Metal (in the case of Slough Feg) or Power Metal (in the majority of borderline cases and bands with names derived from Judas Priest lyrics). Some artists can toe the line between NWOTHM and Thrash Revival, they are reviving an old school sound from the eighties but can’t help mixing in some of their other influences.

Sometimes reviving sounds from the early 80s isn’t enough to actually designate a band as either NWOTHM however. Some Metalcore bands such as Bullet For My Valentine and Shadows Fall sometimes intend to come across as a revival of Thrash or Trad Metal but their choice of production styles and choruses separate them from the generally agreed upon Thrash Revival or NWOTHM sound.

In any case, none of these later bands would sound anything like they do without the NWOBHM and Traditional Heavy Metal bands of the late seventies to mid-eighties.

Thrash Metal’s importance in the history, definition and continuing evolution of Metal cannot be understated and instances of Thrash Metal’s biggest bands’ influence on subsequent generations are almost too numerous to count. Although a lot of people may consider Thrash as an extreme subgenre, in a lot of ways it is sort of a distillation of the real heart and soul of most of Metal’s core sounds and values.

During the commercial peak of Hair Metal, when bands made music with part of Metal’s key sound and popularized it to a wider audience at the expense of what certain Metal fans considered Metal’s core values and credibility; Thrash Metal took that key sound, attitude and those core values and did its best to highlighted them, at times deliberately cultivating an audience of anti-Hair Metal fans as a sort of gut-level marketing technique (in the same way that many Punk bands had done to Prog a decade earlier).

Many of the Thrash bands took influence from the original Heavy Metal bands and the NWOBHM movement, as well as from the Punk Movement (as well of course as from Motörhead who combined elements of the two) and combined them in such a way as to create a new subgenre the primary characteristics of which were speed and aggression (more so than could already be said for Rock, Punk and Metal Music in general that is).

In the early years of Thrash, bands like Metallica, Anthrax and Overkill combined the key elements of these two styles, covering or taking influence from tracks by the likes of Black Sabbath, Judas Priest and Iron Maiden (and Diamond Head especially in the case of Metallica) as much as by the likes of GBH, Sex Pistols and Dead Boys.

In the later years of Thrash’s first incarnation, bands began writing longer, more complex tracks and albums like ‘…And Justice For All’ and ‘The Years Of Decay,’ which demonstrated a very progressive attitude but without actually becoming full-out Prog albums.

After Thrash became popular several existing Metal bands, such a Judas Priest, Accept and Raven took on elements of Thrash Metal into their own sound. This was also true of Punk and Hardcore Punk bands, which gave rise to the Crossover Thrash sub-subgenre, in which Thrash Metal bands like Nuclear Assault, M.O.D and others would take large elements of the Hardcore Punk sound into their own Thrash music and Punk and Hardcore Punk bands like The Exploited, Corrosion Of Conformity, D.R.I etc would make Punk music that incorporated a lot of Thrash Metal’s sounds.

Thrash Metal also played a large part in the invention and popularization of the emerging Death Metal, Power Metal, Prog Metal and Black Metal Subgenres, as well as the later Groove Metal, Melodeath, Metalcore and Thrash Revival subgenres. Types of riffs, general approaches to instruments and drumming styles that were either invented or popularized by early pioneers such as Dave Mustaine, Dave Lombardo, Cliff Burton and Gary Holt can be found to some extent or other in most forms of Metal that came afterwards:

The Blast Beat, a key component of most Grindcore, Black Metal and Death Metal albums was arguably invented (or at least popularized) by Charlie Benante on Crossover Thrash band S.O.D’s debut album.

Helloween, who are one of the most important bands in the history of Power Metal started off as a Thrash Metal band.

Prog Metal band Dream Theater have covered numerous tracks by Metallica, including the entire ‘Master Of Puppets’ album.

Many of the early Death Metal albums still featured a lot of key Thrash Metal musical tropes, and the genre was arguably named in a song by Possessed, who were considered a Thrash band by many (although some fans have retroactively deigned them a Death Metal band). Many Death Metal bands, from Decapitated to Six Feet Under have covered music by Thrash Metal bands, especially Slayer. Cannibal Corpse have covered Metallica and Napalm Death have covered songs by both Sepultura and Kreator.

The Thrash Metal bands Sodom and Sabbat, along with several ‘War Metal’ or ‘Viking Metal’ bands like Celtic Frost, Venom, Hellhammer and Bathory who were at least partially Thrash Metal were heavily influential on Black Metal bands to the point of being considered part of a First Wave Of Black Metal that pre-dates the actual establishment of the genre as its recognized today (the first wave of which is considered to be the second wave of Black Metal by purists).

Cradle Of Filth, who are associated with but separate from Black Metal, have covered both Slayer and Sodom.

Thrash also influenced Metalcore bands; like Shadows Fall and Trivum, who made their love of Thrash Metal known frequently sonically, in interviews and in their choice of covers are sometimes actually referred to as Thrash Metal bands by certain fans and even magazines. Chimaira took considerable lead guitar influence from Metallica and Lamb Of God owe a large portion of their sound to Slayer.

The Thrash Metal band Anthrax even played a hand in the popularization of Rap Metal/Nu Metal due to the success of their track ‘Bring The Noise’ which was a reworking of a track by the Hip-Hop band Public Enemy and actually featured Public Enemy rapping over Thrash Metal guitar riffs, something of a unique event at the time. They rapped over their own music even earlier on the track ‘I’m The Man.’ Metallica, Megadeth and Sepultura also had an influential impact on the Nu Metal subgenre with their Self-Titled (Black), ‘Countdown To Extinction’ and ‘Roots’ albums respectively. Furthermore, Thrash had, in part, an indirect impact on the Nu Metal (and in fact Doom Metal) movement through a reactionary contrast to its focus on speed, while the non-relenting intensity of most Thrash songs also had a similar effect on Grunge and Nu Metal songs which then chose to have much more broken up and dynamic song structures, after a decade of what some of those bands would have considered to be bands taking things to far in one direction.

Recently; there has been a revival of Thrash Metal movement, featuring bands like Municipal Waste, Revoker, Gama Bomb, SSS, Evile and others, in which bands attempt to largely recreate the sound of classic 1980s Thrash Metal often as strictly as possible.

Like other forms of music, Thrash musician’s non-musical work is sometimes noteworthy, such as Thrash Musicians like Ross Robinson and Andy Sneap going on to become important producers who have a hand in defining what the current sound of Metal is.

Overall; Thrash Metal, especially its most important and famous bands and albums, had and continues to have an unarguable impact on the history and sound of Metal music.

Groove Metal was directly influenced by Thrash and is also known by certain fans as “Post Thrash,” or even actually just considered to still be Thrash by others. It isn’t technically a real subgenre on its own, but the post-Thrash release of albums like Chaos AD, Vulgar Display Of Power and Demanufacture has had an unmistakably large impact on the world of Metal.

The Thrash band Exhorder’s music bares a lot of sonic similarities with Groove Metal and had a direct and audible influence on the definitive Groove Metal band Pantera’s music. Pantera singer Phil Anselmo had even been a roadie for Exhorder at a time when Pantera were primarily playing a Glam/Hair derived form of music.

Sepultura, who released one of the definitive Groove Metal albums of all time in ‘Chaos AD’ were primarily a Thrash Metal band before its release (as well as being considered a Death Metal band by many fans).

Robb Flynn of the influential Groove Metal band was a member of the Thrash Metal band Vio-lence and took a large part of the Thrash style with him into Machine Head’s sound.

Death Metal’s validity and place within Metal is often unquestioned by most informed fans. The subgenre in many ways represents the logical conclusion of many of Metal’s key characteristics. Lyrically, vocally, and in terms of speed, heaviness and detuning, atonality and the physical challenge of actually being able to play the music, Death Metal is often the absolute extreme of each characteristic, or very close to the absolute extreme.

Death Metal’s popularity and limitations on popularity affected several bands. Fear Factory for example actually started out as a Death Metal band before developing their signature sound, and Entombed, who released some of the genre’s most definitive material on their first two albums eventually mixed it with Hard Rock with the ‘Wolverine Blues’ album. Morbid Angel combined it with Nu Metal and Industrial music on ‘Illud Divinium Insanus.’ Carcass and Napalm Death combined Grindcore with Death Metal on their ‘The Necroticism’ and ‘Harmony Corruption’ albums, although Carcass then went on to combine this with Traditional Heavy Metal and make one of the most influential albums for Melodeath bands in ‘Heartwork.’

One of the biggest influences that Death Metal had on other forms of music was in the form of the popularization of guttural Death Vocals, which other bands since Death Metal became popular often use sparingly either as backing vocals, for a few brief sections per song or in rare instances for a whole out-of-character track. Even Mondo Generator and Green Day for example each have at least one song (‘Girls Like Christ’ and ‘Take Back’ respectively) in which Death Vocals are used over the bands’ normal Punk music.

In addition to the vocal style, the general intensity and perceived brutality of the genre influenced many popular non-Death Metal bands. Pantera famously made their music heavier on Far Beyond Driven due to a love of the genre, and Slipknot incorporated death influenced Blast Beats into their second though to fourth albums. Soulfly, who started off as a combination Nu Metal and Groove Metal band gradually incorporated many Thrash and later Death Metal elements into their sound over the years and have featured guest vocal appearances from Death Metal singers including David Vincent of Morbid Angel and Travis Ryan of Cattle Decapitation.

The combination of Death Metal with other subgenres such as Grindcore and Traditional Heavy Metal gave rise to subgenres such as Goregrind and Melodic Death Metal. Bands from Pig Destroyer and The Berzerker to Soilwork and At The Gates owe a large part of their sound to Death Metal.

Death Metal also had a clear and direct influence on Metalcore. Killswitch Engage, Shadows Fall and Parkway Drive for example have taken influence from Death Metal to form a part of their sound, primarily through the aforementioned vocals but also through subtle guitar influences. Chimaira took an even more direct guitar influence from Six Feet Under and Cannibal Corpse. Slipknot are also heavily influenced by several Death Metal artists, including Deicide and bands like Messugah and later Periphery and Uneven Structure were directly and indirectly influenced by Death Metal’s prevalent atonal guitar style and low tunings.

The sub-subgenre of Deathcore is a form of Metalcore that is even more specifically inclusive of Death Metal tropes. Much like Crossover Thrash, the music came both from excessively Death Metal influenced Metalcore bands as well as from excessively Metalcore influenced Death Metal bands. Bands like Job For A Cowboy and Whitechapel can sound strictly Death Metal one moment and play things a Death Metal band would never play moments later.

From the early Death Metal-esque Thrash albums of Sepultura and Possesed to the Tampa Scene, to technical and progressive Death Metal bands, as well as Blackened Death Metal bands who combine elements of both Black and Death Metal, and Melodic Death Metal bands with inspirational lead guitarists; Death Metal has had a wide and lasting influence on the sound and history of Metal ever since its invention, most notably in the field of extreme metal, but also on a surprising number of bigger and more commercial bands too.

*** Grindcore has is roots in both Anarchopunk and Hardcore Punk, but over the years has mixed together with elements of other extreme Metal subgenres in interesting ways. There are Crossover points that are Death Metal bands playing Grindcore riffs, Black Metal bands using extremely brief song durations, Grindcore bands changing into Death Metal bands over time. Members of Grindcore albums have joined, toured with, worked as a producer on or had their records produced by members of Death Metal bands or Thrash bands or even Hardcore bands.

For example Exhumed have covered Possesed, King Diamond and Sodom. Exhumed’s debut was produced by Death’s James Murphy. Travis from Cattle Decapitation has guest appeared with Soulfly and Chimaira. Both Deicide’s Glen Benton and Obituary’s John Tardy appear on Napalm Death’s ‘Unfit Earth.’ Decaptiated have covered Napalm Death. Vader have covered Terrorizer.

At times the distinction between Grindcore and Death Metal becomes blurred, and Deathgrind and Goregrind are used to term bands like this, although over time these bands have influenced other artists to the point of starting distinct genres of their own.

Some bands have mixed progressive ideas, or electronic sounds with it to create new and interesting variations on the base sound.

Black Metal evolved into different subgenres by mixing with other sounds such as industrial, ambient, soundscape, folk, thrash, death, prog, shoegaze etc.

Children Of Bodom and Opeth both have artistic roots in Black Metal but present entirely different sounds.

Bands mix parts of Black Metal with hardcore, early Swedish Death Metal and modern punk to create new music. Trap Them, Black Breath and Kvelertak would sound utterly different if not for the influence of Black Metal. Even Metalcore bands like Chimaira owe at least one song’s sound to the influence of Black Metal.

Folk Metal is a vague term that can apply to a whole host of vastly different bands. Adding folk instrumentation, playing reinterpretations of traditional folk pieces or having folklore based lyrics and imagery all can land a band with the folk metal tag. The bands may have their roots in Black Metal, Melodic Death Metal, Power Metal, Thrash Metal (or anything else) and two folk metal bands may share almost no sonic similarities excluding the fact that they use additional bow or wind based instruments and may write lyrics about folklore, or in some cases alcohol. Commonly, the vocals may not be delivered in English as frequently as they would be in other subgenres.

With that being said, there are many Folk Metal bands who share a similar aesthetic in terms of their metal influence and not just their folk influence. Two of the most common types of Folk Metal are those rooted in Melodic European Power Metal and those rooted in Black Metal.

There are folk metal bands who take things very seriously and bands who are very over the top and silly, there are bands with comedy overtones and who dress in costumes as well as those who just play Metal as any normal band, but with parts of their music rooted in folk music.

Similarly, many bands may use folk influences, additional instrumentation, sing about their own cultures or in their own languages but still escape the term, for example Soulfly and Jurojin.

Much like Folk Metal, Symphonic Metal is a very vague subgenre title and not entirely agreed upon by Metal fans and musicologists. Many Metal bands may work with a Symphony orchestra and not get labeled as Symphonic Metal. There are also very Symphonic Black Metal albums by Dimmu Borgir and Emperor (to name but a few) that are not often called Symphonic Black Metal and there are very symphonic Power Metal albums by Rhapsody that aren’t always called Symphonic Metal, because they don’t specifically sound like Amber Dawn and Nightwish.

Similarly there are Nu Metal and Alternative Metal bands that utilize very similar sounds, approaches and imagery to Symphonic Metal (ie. In This Moment, Lacuna Coil) but are not routinely called Symphonic Metal, because the non-symphonic components of their sound are too different. Sometimes the combination of the two styles is jokingly referred to as “Corset Metal” due to the prominence of Female lead singers in Gothic clothing.

Fleshgod Apocalypse have popularized the idea of Symphonic Death Metal in recent years.

Symphonic Metal bands often have their roots in Power Metal, Classical Music, Progressive Rock and Gothic Music, often with Neoclassical influenced guitar and a very prominent Keyboard Player. However while this sentence could easily describe Children Of Bodom, the exact blend of influences seems to be key to making a band get categorized as Symphonic Metal.

The basic template for Power Metal is laid down by the mixture of Judas Priest and Iron Maiden. The bands often place a lot of emphasis on virtuosity and an over-the-top spirit. They usually add especially fast music (although usually without the sheer ferocity of Thrash), and a lot of very grand sing-along choruses. Often Dio era Rainbow and Queen will inform the sound, and most bands, especially in later waves, like to play “cheesy” ballads.

Many Power Metal bands also like to employ lead Keyboards, in the tradition of Deep Purple, often dueling solos between a keyboard player and a guitarist …although it is not a requirement (in fact the keystone album for the Genre, Keeper Of The Seven Keys by Helloween, doesn’t feature a lead keyboardist).

Yngvie Malmsteen, Accept, The Scorpions and Running Wild were all huge influences on a lot of Power Metal bands and help to define its “European Sound.”

Although Power Metal is often thought of as being really European, that is only part of the story. The Genre is often split into two spiritual camps: 1) “Melodic” or European Power Metal (although bands from non-Euopeans often play this kind of music and 2) USPM – The American Kind – (although bands from non-Americans often play this kind of music).

With USPM, especially the later stuff, a huge early-Metallica and Painkiller-era-Judas Priest is often detectable. Bands like Savatage, Crimson Glory and Queensryche (who fit comfortably into early Prog Metal brackets as well) can be viewed as a sort of first wave of USPM and inform a lot of the sound too. The influence of Warning era Queensryche on Iced Earth for example is absolutely undeniable (just compare ‘Roads To Madness’ and ‘Melancholy [Holy Martyr]’ to see how much).

Only Two camps is an oversimplification of course, as there are different approaches, attitudes and mixtures with which bands can take things. Power Metal bands can often blur the lines between Folk Metal, Prog Metal, Melodic Death Metal or Thrash Metal on different songs or albums. Grave Digger are heavier than Stratovarius but not quite as heavy as Children Of Bodom.

Some Progressive Metal bands started off in the early 80s as almost indistinguishable from Traditional Heavy Metal in the vein of Iron Maiden and Judas Priest, usually based around grand melodic vocal lines and occasional piercing screams as well as frequent guitar solos.

In many cases it wasn’t until the late 80s where the bands would become fully progressive by taking a more obvious sonic influence from Prog bands as well as using existing Prog traditions such as writing concept albums.

These more Traditional Progressive Metal bands (which should be an oxymoron, surely?) like Savatage, Crimson Glory, Fates Warning etc had a lot of sonic similarities with both the earlier work of Power Metal bands (Such as Helloween’s ‘Keeper Of The Seven Keys’ title track) as well as the more theatrical moments from Thrash Metal bands (such as Overkill’s three self-titled tracks and Annihilator’s ‘Fun Palace’).

The extremely strong crossover between all these subgenres, at a stage when subgenres were more truly subgenres with less of a claim to separate-genre-status than they arguably have today, is a contributing factor in why certain people view certain blatantly Metal acts by today’s broader standards as not actually being Metal. The mutual sonic link between genres in this arbitrary point in the evolution of Metal (long after the actual beginning, but before several of the important innovations) however is not actually definitive of the boundaries of the entire Metal genre as they stand today, and things which fall outside the sonic boundaries of this period can still be considered as Metal.

It wasn’t so much until the mid-to-late 90s when bands would become truly progressive by writing music that was utterly unique from anything that had ever came before. As opposed to simply writing Metal songs with a Prog influence, they would come to truly progress the boundaries of what Metal could sound like and indeed what still ‘counted as’ Metal.

With the popularization of Grunge and then the wider Alternative Rock/Metal movement which included among other things early Pop-Punk, Brit Rock, Stoner Rock as well as certain Pop and Singer Songwriter musicians, the scope of areas within which Metal could be Progressed widened.

Tool, for example, emerged in the middle of the Grunge scene and since became one of the most influential and important bands in the Metal scene.

Later; Queensrÿche, who were one of the originators of what is considered to be the Traditional Prog Metal sound actually mixed Progressive Metal with Grunge on 1997’s ‘Hear In The Now Frontier’ and with Alternative Metal on ‘Tribe.’ Mudvayne conversely mixed Nu Metal with Prog on ‘L.D 50’ and Rush mixed an Alternative music sound with their own on their ‘Counterparts’ album.

Bands like Mastodon and Baroness later combined influences from the Sludge scene they emerged from and combined that with already Sludge-influenced Post Metal bands like Neurosis and Isis as well as selected Progressive Rock traits to once again create genuinely Progressive Metal that bypasses the aforementioned Traditional Prog Metal sound but still deserves the ‘Progressive’ description. Without Hardcore Punk like Black Flag and Flipper inspiring Sludgey Grunge and Metal derived bands like The Melvins and Neurosis, the shape of Prog Metal today would be radically different.

Furthermore, without the existence and influence of Metal as it stands today, several important Prog bands (such as Porcupine Tree and The Mars Volta) would sound vastly different. Even band’s from the very beginning of Prog, including King Crimson themselves actually incorporated Metal into their sound on recent albums.

Prog Metal is a very important influence on the Djent movement and many Djent bands are sometimes categorized as Progressive Metal.

Furthermore; in addition to the music that is commonly considered to be either Prog or Post Metal, some Thrash Metal and Death Metal bands display the kind of innovative thinking and musical complexity of progressive bands, but still stick within their subgenre’s stylistic boundaries, and ignore the addition and influence of popular Prog tropes such as the inclusion of mellotron, and are defined separately as technical rather than progressive although the distinction is often very subtle and often blurred (sometimes people use “Technical” as a substitute term for “Progressive” however usually it also has distinct connotations of a specific sound and direction in and of itself).

Separate from Prog Metal, the Progressive genre of Post-Metal exists. Post Metal is analogous to Post Rock in its attitude and conventions, but distinct due to its much heavier and intense sound. It is often characterized by a focus on texture as well as favouring of long slow build-ups, instrumental music, use of repetition to create depth and layers and slow challenging. Neurosis, one of the genre’s most famous acts started their career as a straight up Hardcore Punk band, and with each album moved further and further into unique and unexplored musical territories which combined Metal with numerous influences, including folk.

During the late 80s and throughout the 90s, there was a trend of incorporating elements of Funk into rock and metal. This became popular in the Alternative and Nu Metal scenes but also came up in unexpected areas like Hair Metal, Thrash Metal and Death Metal on a smaller scale. Some bands would do it for one song only, or only on their demos, before getting signed and dropping the funk side of their sound due to a change in the musical climate, for example Slipknot and Powerman 5000.

Several of the more successful albums to feature this cross over of styles went on to be influential to a multitude of other bands from various spheres.

Extreme and Progressive Metal took large influence from Industrial Music. Artists like Fear Factory, The Berzerker and Aborym combined Industrial tendencies with Extreme Metal. Napalm Death were influenced by Godflesh. Isis have covered Godflesh Many Nu Metal artists such as Powerman 5000, Rob Zombie and Spineshank combined an industrial flavour with Nu Metal.

Existing bands such as Morbid Angel and Killing Joke incorporated Industrial into their sounds.

When you combine influences from Grunge, Groove Metal, Funk Metal and Industrial Metal, you will probably end up sounding somewhere within the broad Nu Metal spectrum. Nu Metal is a very broad term. Some bands blended the mixture of influences very differently to others. Some emphasized more parts from Grunge while others emphasized more of the Hip Hop or Industrial side of things. American Headcharge for example are very different sounding to the Deftones and Linkin Park are very different to Orgy.

Nu Metal is a subgenre which often has its credibility or validity as a part of Metal either criticized or questioned. Like Hair Metal, its broader appeal and more-commercial sound caused resentment among several fans and journalists. Its phenomenal commercial success and broadening of the fanbase however created many opportunities for other types of Metal bands and in the long run helped to strengthen the health of Metal as a whole.

Part of the reason for this is that several sections of Nu Metal songs, and occasionally entire songs on Nu Metal albums would feature no discernable influence from Metal. Like the original bands to ever get called Heavy Metal, Metal was often only part of the band’s overall repertoire. People are often quick to forget that while bands like Powerman 5000 and Limp Bizkit may have three tracks on an album that feature all rap and no Metal, bands like Led Zeppelin and Black Sabbath would do the exact same thing with Folk or Blues music.

Despite gaining a bad reputation among Metal fans (to the point where many Nu Metal bands get reclassified as Hard Rock, Wrestle-Metal, Alternative Metal or other things by people who like them but don’t want to admit to liking the Nu Metal genre) the genre’s large popularity was essential in the health and popularity of Metal as a whole and provided a gateway through which fans could discover and then chose to explore the entirety of Metal. Some of the highest ever recorded album sales happened during the Nu Metal era, and fans wishing to see Nu Metal bands at festivals like Ozzfest became exposed to bands like Slayer and Black Sabbath who they otherwise wouldn’t have heard in everyday life.

Some of the primary musical influences for Nu Metal bands included things like Black Sabbath’s early records and Metallica’s Black album, from which the bands often in-part derived the heavy part of their sounds.

Nu Metal was also influenced by Hip Hop. Many Nu Metal bands incorporated parts of Hip-Hop into their sound to some degree or other, be that in the form of rapping or DJ scratching, or in lyrical direction, the use of sampling or choice of production style. Furthermore, several bands collaborated with Rap and Hip Hop artists and had them guest appear on their records. Even non-Nu Metal bands including Metallica, Slayer and Black Sabbath recorded tracks with guest rappers like Ice-T, even if they didn’t always make it on to studio albums. This also had an important effect on expanding the demographic of Metal and exposed the music to fans of Hip Hop who otherwise may not have chosen to explore Metal. The popularity of rap in Nu Metal even lead the Stoner Rock band Clutch to record the parody Rap Metal track ‘Careful With That Mic…’

In addition to Metal and Hip Hop; a large influence on Nu Metal’s sound was the combination of the Grunge and Alternative movements, from which several key song structure traits and vocal style s were incorporated. Soil for example, had vocal influences from Alice In Chains as much as they had musical influences from Pantera. Korn and Deftones use of dynamics where the heaviest parts of the song would be saved for the chorus and ending of the song while the rest of the song was minimalist was popularized by Nirvana both Sunna and The Union Underground wrote tracks clearly influenced by Kurt Cobain. The genre’s dispostion towards personal-angst themed lyrics can also be attributed to Grunge and Alternative music.

During the genre’s commercial peak, existing Metal bands allowed Nu Metal influences into their own sound. Machine Head for example incorporated parts of its sound on their third and fourth albums, and Fear Factory did the same with their ‘Digimortal’ record as did Biohazard on ‘Uncivilization.’ Sepultura’s ‘Roots’ album featured guest appearance from musicians from Faith No More, Korn and Limp Bizkit and Metallica’s ‘Load’ album had guest guitar from Faith No More’s Jim Martin.

Chimaira actually started out with a large Nu Metal aspect to their sound before developing their signature sound.

Soulfly’s early work had a lot of Nu Metal influences, and the band collaborated with members of Limp Bizkit, Skindred, Slipknot, Deftones, Cypress Hill and Ill Nino

The subgenre has a strong indirect impact on almost all the other main Metal subgenres, the musicians from whom were quick to distance themselves from it and had a reactionary response to demonstrate their ‘true’ sound and consequently altered their own music as a result. In effect, Nu Metal can be considered in-part responsible for the re-popularization of Traditional Heavy Metal as well as Thrash Metal and also in-part responsible for the specific level of extremity in many extreme Metal albums released during and since Nu Metal’s inception.

The influence of Nu Metal is now beginning to be felt of a new generation bands as well. Five Finger Death Punch for example have drawn influence from parts of Nu Metal while maintaining a different overall sound that is based more around Metalcore, as have Djent bands including Tesseract and Periphery, and indeed so too have some new bands from historically important Metal musicians, such as Adrenaline Mob and Hell Yeah both of which in-part conform to some Nu Metal traditions. Nu Metal also had a more direct influence on Hyro Da Hero.

Southern Metal, is not necesarily a genre, and sometimes bands who play that style of music not necesarily even Southern-states Americans, however, across the spectrum of Sludge, Stoner, Nu Metal and very Hard Rock their are numerous bands that take an especially large influence from either country music or Southern Rock and get labeled as ‘Southern Metal’ and have their riffs described as ‘Southern-fried.’

More recently, being influenced by Pantera and/or Black Label Society have also become the most common signposts for Southern Metal bands.

Some bands like Baroness, Soil and Halfway To Gone have incorporated the style subtly and sparingly, while others have made it the defining characteristic of their sound, also adding southern values and tropes to their lyrics, artwork, stage show and dress sense.

***

Nirvana - Bleach, 1989, Grunge, USA

Nirvana - Nevermind, 1991, Grunge, USA

Nirvana - In Utero, 1993, Grunge, USA

Pearl Jam - Ten, 1991, Grunge, USA

Pearl Jam - VS, 1993, Grunge, USA

Alice In Chains - Facelift, 1990, Grunge, USA

Alice In Chains - Dirt, 1992, Grunge, USA

Sound Garden - Badmotorfinger, 1991, Grunge, USA

Sound Garden - Superunknown, 1994, Grunge, USA

Mudhoney - Every Good Boy Deserves Fudge, 1991, Grunge, USA

Temple Of The Dog - Temple Of The Dog, 1991, Grunge, USA

Silverchair - Frogstomp, 1995, Grunge, Austrailia

Jane’s Addiction - Nothing’s Shocking, 1988, Mixed (With Grunge) USA

Screaming Trees - Sweet Oblivion, 1992, Mixed (With Grunge) USA

Stone Temple Pilots - Core, 1992, Grunge, USA

Smashing Pumpkins - Siamese Dream, 1993, Mixed (With Grunge) USA

The Melvins - Bullhead, 1981, Mixed (With Grunge & Sludge) USA

The Melvins - Houdini, 1993, Mixed (With Grunge & Sludge) USA

***

Despite being hated and sometimes willingly misunderstood by a vocal-minority of Metal fans, the controversial subgenre of Grunge is a blatantly important part of the interconnected tapestry of Rock, Punk and Metal music. It owes part of its heritage to the sound and spirit of Punk Rock, as well as to the slower Hardcore Punk bands like Flipper and mid-period Black Flag. It also owes a part of its musical heritage to the early Heavy Metal moments from bands like Black Sabbath and Led Zeppelin. Just listen to how suspiciously like Black Sabbath’s ‘Sweet Leaf’ that Silverchair’s ‘Leave Me Out’ sounds.

Soundgarden where famously described as sounding like Black Sabbath with Robert Plant on vocals. A small influence from Progressive Rock can also be found in many of the genre’s bands. Soundgarden have covered music by Jimi Hendrix, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Ramones, The Stooges, Budgie, Black Sabbath, and even Body Count. In turn their music was covered by bands like Evanescence, Between The Buried And Me, The Dillinger Escape Plan and others.

Alice In Chains actually started off as a Glam Metal band before adopting the Grunge sound. They have often been described as a sort of missing link between Metal and Grunge due to their hard guitar sound and often dark songwriting. They toured on the Clash Of The Titans tour with Anthrax, Slayer and Megadeth before becoming international stars. Their music has been covered by bands like Adema, Shinedown, Grave and Opeth. Black Label Society wrote a song to honour the death of their singer.

Pearl Jam have covered music by Pink Floyd, The Beatles, Jimi Hendrix, The Rolling Stones, Dead Boys, The Who, The MC5, The Ramones, Dead Kennedys and many more artists from varied places along the rock spectrum, and their music has been covered by bands like Seether.

Nirvana cited numerous artists from Black Flag, to King Crimson to David Bowie to The Velvet Underground, and Nirvana even covered music by Led Zeppelin (as well as sarcastically covering Kiss). Their drummer Dave Ghrol was a Thrash Metal drummer before joining Nirvana and famously was influenced by bands like Celtic Frost, Vemon, Voivod, Motörhead, Corrosion Of Conformity and others.

The Melvins had a large impact on the Sludge sound. They have covered music by the likes of Kiss, Alice Cooper, Pink Floyd, The Velvet Underground, Flipper, Nirvana etc and have had their music covered by bands including Pig Destroyer, Brutal Truth, Mastodon and Helemt.

Mudhoney have covered music from Motörhead and Black Flag and had their music covered by bands like The Melvins and Pitchshifter.

Smashing Pumpkins covered music by Led Zeppelin, Marilyn Manson, Thin Lizzy, Alice Cooper, Blue Öster Cult, Cheap Trick, The Who, David Bowie, Blue Cheer, Pink Floyd, Rush and The Velvet Underground. Their music has been covered by Marilyn Manson

The overall effect that Grunge had on Metal was fairly large. Bands from Soil to Ancient Vvisdom and Sixty Watt Shaman have taken vocal inspiration from the grunge movement. Countless Nu Metal bands took structural influence from Grunge and many existing bands, such as Queensrÿche, Kiss and Motely Crue incorporated aspects of grunge into their sound during the 1990s.

Grunge, like Nu Metal, also caused a reactionary trend of Metal musicians deliberately sounding more Metal, and doing things either more extremely or more traditionally in response to bands who were seen to ‘sell out’ by incorporating Grunge influences into their own music.

It is often mistakenly stated that Grunge music killed Metal in the 1990s, but a great many of the most important Metal albums in history were released in the 1990s. Only Thrash Metal and Hair Metal were really all that affected by the popularity of Grunge, but they also suffered from having run their course already for almost decade, a point at which most subgenres fall out of public favour (before an inevitable revival.)

During the 1990s when Grunge had supposedly killed Metal, many of the most important and seminal Death Metal, Black Metal, Power Metal, Folk Metal, Prog Metal, Sludge Metal, Grindcore, Groove Metal, Nu Metal, Metal-Hardcore Crossover and Stoner Rock albums were released and some of the earlier Melodeath and Metalcore albums were released. Despite having supposed to have been killed, in reality Metal had diversified and had even found new audiences among fans from other worlds, like Jazz, Classsical Music and Hip Hop.

Like the Grunge Movement, the wider net of the entire Alternative Rock spectrum had a similar effect on the Rock and Metal scene, especially in the 1990s, but its impact can still be felt today. Radiohead for example have greatly influenced Marilyn Manson and Anathema.

Also like Grunge, the Metal scene had an impact on it. The Foo Fighters, The Wildhearts and Therapy? all integrated Metal as a small part of their overall sound. Through these bands many people discovered Metal.

The Stooges and The MC5 were equally important in the development of both Punk and Metal, as well as Grunge, and have been influential on as well as covered by covered by artists as diverse as The Sex Pistols, Red Hot Chili Peppers, Slayer, Def Leppard and Guns N’ Roses, Bad Brains, The Damned, Blue Öyster Cult, Rage Against The Machine, Silverchair, Pearl Jam, The Melvins, Corrosion Of Conformity and Entombed.

The original crossover of punk and metal attitudes resulted in things like Iron Maiden’s debut album, where the Prog and Heavy Metal influenced Steve Harris lead a band that was fronted by the raw and punk influenced Paul D’ianno.

Motörhead, who formed by the former member of the Psychedelic/Prog band Hawkwind, named after one of their songs and who played three Hawkwind songs on their debut album, originally featured members of the Punk band Pink Fairies before hiring their definitive line-up and the band have always been described as sounding like a mixture between Punk and Metal despite primarily taking large influence from original Rock N Roll artists like Chuck Berry and Eddie Cochran.

The Sex Pistols have been covered numerous times by artists throughout Metal history, including Megadeth, Anthrax, Motörhead and countless others. Metallica and Anthrax were both influenced by, and covered songs by The Ramones.

Hardcore Punk had a huge impact on Metal; both directly through big things like the Crossover Thrash style, and small things like Slayer’s ‘Undisputed Attitude’ covers album as well as Napalm Death’s ‘Leader Not Followers 2,’ to bands like Black Flag and Flipper’s slow and messy styles influencing Sludge Metal and Grunge, which would then influence future Nu Metal and several modern era Prog Metal bands.

Members of Hardcore Punk bands have went on to join some of the biggest bands in Metal; Verbal Abuse’s Chris Kontos drummed for Machine Head, Suicidal Tendencies’ Rob Trujilo played bass for Ozzy Osbourne and Metallica, C.O.C’s Pepper Keenan joined Down, Carnivore’s Pete Steel would sing for Type O Negative etc.

Members of Hardcore bands have also had considerable influence on the Metal scene overall in other ways, such as by becoming producers (e.g. Steve Albini, Ian MacKaye), journalists and television personalities (e.g. Henry Rollins) or by running record labels (e.g. Jello Biafra).

After Crossover Thrash a generation of Metal-influenced Hardcore bands like Sick Of It All, Biohazard, Earth Crisis, Madball and others started making music that was reminiscent both of the Hardcore scene they came from as well as the Groove Metal scene that was popular in Metal at the time. These bands would cover songs by bands like Black Sabbath as well as by bands like Cro-Mags and they would tour and collaborate with bands like Sepultura, Machine Head and Pantera (two of whom have covered songs by the Hardcore band Poison Idea) and members of these bands would occasionally guest appear on each other’s albums or play together in each other’s live sets.

Later Bands like Romeo Must Die, Stampin’ Ground and Hatebreed combined this modern Hardcore with Metal in one way, while bands like Killswitch Engage, Shadows Fall, All That Remains would combine it in another way and this would create the genre originally known as New Wave Of American Heavy Metal, before it was renamed as Metalcore. Eventually, subsequent waves of this music and albums by these bands would emerge with a less of a mixture between metal and hardcore music and a more definitive genre sound of its own. This type of music would be adopted by artists that were not from America, such as Parkway Drive.

The inception of Post Hardcore and the original wave of Emo, which later evolved into both Screamo as well as a future generation of lighter, better produced and more Pop Punk influenced Emo bands like My Chemical Romance, as well as the UK Hardcore scene had a huge impact on Metal. This had a large impact on British and Australian Metalcore bands like Architects, Bring Me The Horizon, The Devil Wears Prada etc.

Furthermore the Post Rock movement would have obvious impact upon the Post Metal scene, with its often instrumental nature, its highly mood and build-up focused directions, and recurring several riff and production themes. It would also have an influence on Prog Metal bands. Post Rock also became a considerable influence on many instrumental Progressive Metal and Djent bands like Animals As Leaders and Scale The Summit.

Then came bands like A Day To Remember who combined Pop-Punk with Metalcore, to create a primarily bright and summery music with Hatebreed-esque breakdowns and beatdowns. They sound as heavy as Parkway Drive at the end of the song and as commercial as New Found Glory at the beginning. Without Pop-Punk these bands would sound totally different, without Hardcore Punk they would sound totally different and without Metal they would sound totally different.

Post Hardcore, Emo and Pop-Punk’s influence can even be felt far afield in surprising areas such as Progressive Metal, where bands like Protest The Hero and Coheed & Cambria would not sound the same without it having existed.

Overall; The influence of Punk as well as having a direct and obvious impact on certain aspects of Metal, often slowly and subtly trickled down throughout the years and bands as diverse as Soulfly, Skindred, Mastodon, Black Tusk, Architects and Enter Shikari all directly and indirectly owe both large and small portions of their sound to the existence of various genres and subgenres of Punk and Hardcore Punk (an yes, even Pop-Punk) throughout the years. Without Punk and Hardcore, most of the Metal we know today would not exist or would sound completely different.

Stoner, Sludge, Doom & Drone, very different approaches to a similar ideal. The bands share similar influences and influence similar artists, but approach their music with differing proportions of those influences. Some take music in a more Psychedelic direction, some take it in a more Metallic direction and some take it in a very Black Sabbath influenced direction. Black Sabbath cover songs are common among Stoner Rock and Doom Metal bands.

Often bands in one of these categories blur the lines between some or all of them, across different songs or albums or periods in their career. Some take things in a brighter, more Classic Rock direction, while others take things in a more dense, Post-Rock sort of direction. Any of these styles can be combined with elements of Thrash, Death, Black or Progressive Metal to wildly different results.

High On Fire have covered Judas Priest and Celtic Frost. Corrosion of Conformity and Monster Magnet have both covered both Black Sabbath and the MC5. Fu Manchu have covered Black Flag, Thin Lizzy and Blue Oyster Cult. Five Horse Johnson have covered David Bowie and Areosmith. Fireball Ministry have covered Judas Priest, Areosmith, UFO, Alice Cooper, Blue Cheer and Misfits. Orange Goblin have also covered Misfits.

Queens Of The Stone Age have covered The Kinks, ZZ Top, Subhumans, Billy Idol and Turbonegro. Rob Halford of Judas Priest, Billy Gibbons of ZZ Top, Trent Reznor of Nine Inch Nails and Jon Theadore of The Mars Volta has guested with Queens Of The Stone Age. (As well as numerous other Stoner-related artists such as Chris Goss, Pete Stahl and more, and collaborations with Dave Grohl and Alex Turner of Arctic Monkeys). Josh Homme has guested on tracks by Arctic Monekys, Foo Fighters and Mastodon.

Trouble have also covered The Beatles, Cream and The Monkeys. Saint Vitus have covered Black Flag. Pentagram have covered The Rolling Stones. Solitude Aeturnus have covered Iron Maiden and Ozzy Osbourne. Cirith Ungol have covered The Crazy World Of Arthur Brown.

Paradise Lost have covered Atomic Rooster, Sisters Of Mercy and Venom. They have been covered by Orphaned Land.

Anathema have covered Venom, Slayer and Pink Floyd. They have been covered by Cradle Of Filth

The influence can also be found in unexpected places; The Obsessed have been covered by Foo Fighters. Kyuss have been covered by Tool.

Sludge is often harsher, more unpleasant and more Hardcore influenced than Stoner, Doom and Drone. Sludge has crossed barriers with Post-Metal, Doom Metal and even Progressive Metal. Neurosis and early Mastodon owe a lot sonically to the sound of Sludge.

Ghost Of A Thousand - New Hopes New Demonstrations, 2009, Hardcore, UK

Every Time I Die - Hot Damn, 2003, Mixed, UK

Fall Of Troy - Manipulation, 2007, Mixed (With Hardcore) Canada

****

Metal bands and Hardcore bands have been taking influence from eachother since the very beginning. The influence of Hardcore on Machine Head and Sepultura (and Prong) is obvious.

Metalcore as a term has been applied to really differing collections of music. From the Crossover Thrash of D.R.I and S.O.D to the slower, beefier hardcore of the 90s like Madball, Biohazard, Earth Crisis and Sick Of It All. It has been associated with bands from Nailbomb to Dillenger Escape Plan.

It then become associated with bands who mixed Melodeath, Thrash and Hardcore together such as Killswicth Engage, Shadows Fall, All That Remains etc. and this is now how most people think of the genre. This type of music has also been sub-catagorized into ‘Melodic Metalcore’ although the number of bands who feature little in the way of Melody (Lamb Of God, Devildriver etc.) or much more Post Hardcore and much less Thrash/Groove Metal influence (While She Sleeps etc.) can cause confusion.

That forumla has once again been diversified and expanded in different directions by the likes of Bring Me The Horizon, Architects and Asking Alexandria to incorporate electronic elements and other outside influences to form a different direction of music, still broadly falling under the Metalcore banner.

The diversity of styles associated with Metalcore (especially those artists who have incorporated Emo, Pop-Punk, Post Hardcore or Electronic music very thoroughly into their own sound) has lead to a backlash against Metalcore (and especially Melodic Metalcore) almost akin to the backlash against Hair Metal and Nu Metal.

Metalcore, despite this backlash, is a relevant and important part of the history of Metal. It is clearly and demonstrably a part of Metal overall.

Highly influenced by Progressive Rock, Progressive Metal, Mathcore, Technical Death Metal, and the pioneering work of one off bands like Messugah, Sikth and the Dillenger Escape Plan; Djent is based on an angular and disjointed riff style, often with Progressive tendencies and a Nu Metal bounce. It can be found combined with other types of music such as Hip Hop, Grime or Post Rock.

Many Djent bands incorporate electronic effects, glitch-beats and ambient soundscapes into their sound.

In the same way that Death and Powermetal bands can occasionally use Thrash riffs without being Thrash Metal bands, many Metalcore and Deathcore bands may use Djent riff styles in their music. In the same way that Black Sabbath, Diamond Head and Motorhead may have occasional Thrash sections that inform how Thrash sounds without being Thrash bands themselves, Messugah are not considered to be a Djent band despite the enormous influence they provided the style.

Originally, some members of the Metal community were resistant to the idea of Djent being considered a subgenre of Metal for fear that it was merely a fad, and because it was named after a guitar tone. Over time however, the sheer weight of numbers in the amount of Djent fans and Djent bands from all around the world, who increasingly began to self-identify as being “Djent Bands” and share enough musical similarities to be considered an independent subgenre, has legitimized the term and widely cemented the movement as an official subgenre of Metal, whether a shrinking number of skeptics agree or not. Hair Metal and Nu Metal both suffered the same skepticism in the past, but slowly their legitimacy as subgenres became a matter f fact and not just opinion. Djent has now seen the same transition happen.

Like all Subgenres, some of the bands will be more faithful to the core sound than others, some bands will have a more commercial sound than others, some will be more extreme, some will be rawer and some will be more progressive. Some will incorporate elements into their sound that separate them from the crowd. The main thing is that their is a collective similarity between the bands which ties them together and also distinguishes them from other sub-genres.

One has only to listen to the similarities between acts like Periphery, TesseracT and Monuments; as well as acts like Circles, Destiny Potato, Bulb, Intervals, The Contortionist, Ion Dissonance, Aliases, Sybreed, Returning We Hear the Larks and Eggeh and extrapolate what the Djent sound is.

Important critical failures are important for understanding the holistic entirety of metal. Often they inform other artists who try to avoid the same negative public backlash.

They also often precede a band or sometimes even a large chunk of the genre returning to its roots with revitalized energy and more crowd pleasing set-lists, working with old producers again and generally learning what fans will and won’t support. Even if that can be unfair at times.

These albums are often more talked about than albums which are usually publicly considered to be good. An album that truly bombs will stay in the Metal public’s conscious for longer than an ordinary passable album.

Whether or not they are actually good is a matter of personal taste however. Music is subjective. Just because you don’t like them dosen’t mean they aren’t good.

The take home message is that each and every sub-genre has its innovators and its followers, its credible bands and its commercial bands, its dark moments and its light-hearted moments. There’s always some bands with a strict, human, ‘punk’ feeling, and some bands with an artistic, deep, ‘progressive’ feeling. On top of it all, there’s always some band’s that are so unique they come about at the same time or from the same place as a subgenre but that just don’t fit in with it. Similarly, there are band’s who every other band in a subgenre are influenced by but all manage to miss key features of that band’s sound.

If you like Metal there are a lot of different types to try out, and a lot of different non-metal bands which had a big effect on it that you could also try out to develop a deeper understanding of what these sounds are and why they are happening, and why they are happening in these particular sequences or combinations.

You can understand why different people have different opinions on what counts as Metal and what is just rock, by hearing enough Metal and rock to understand the lines people are drawing by combining knowledge of different band’s sounds in different ratios.

Maybe Twisted Sister sound rock if you only hear ‘I Want To Rock,’ and maybe they sound Metal if you only hear ‘Go To Hell.’ Perhaps you think Bullet For My Valentine are an emo band, but how similar do they actually sound to Rites Of Spring when compared to how similar they sound to Shadows Fall?

The more you hear, the more you will understand, and ultimately the more informed your comments can be. Its always interesting to sit down and find out where all the pieces of the puzzle come from and how the fit together.

- And that was it. If you wonder why an album was included in the list, why not listen to it and find out?

Of course, studio albums are only part of the story; there are also the worlds of demos, live albums and compilations to consider, but that is a story for another day… check back for blogs on that subject to flesh out the full history a bit more.

If this sounds like trolling I apologise, but on giving it some thought, I think in order to have a full and comprehensive understanding of metal, you’d need to listen to just about every metal album ever. For example, for Motley Crue alone, you’d need to listen to Too Fast For Love to understand what a step up Shout At The Devil was, then through to Dr. Feelgood to see the band at the peak of their quality and fame, then to Motley Crue because it was an important step in another direction and THEN Generation Swine to witness the backpedalling of re-recruiting Vince Neil into the fold, and last of all their latest Saints Of Lost Angeles album as an example of the nostalgia-cum-comeback bilge train of modern culture that results in endless reunions and sullying of the past. Knowing two albums from a band with as storied a history as this is simply not enough, and the same could be said for just about every band. Concrete: debut of Ross Robinson – Demanufacture: self-explanatory classic – Archetype: fundamental lineup change – Mechanize: partial lineup re-establishment. Fear Factory’s evolution is a statement in itself of the evolution of metal over three decades, from sound to personal politics and business model, even. Mayhem are another band worth mentioning more of, on account of the lineup changes being so drastic.

Like, looking at it this way there’s no way to do it in 400. Maybe a thousand?

And then you’re talking countless influential underground bands (like the OTHER Pentagram), punk acts like The Exploited… many, many offshoots.

Also you’ve no Soulfly! 1 and Dark Ages are surely important in such a venture. And I’d challenge your defintion of The Colour And The Shape as a grunge album as it is no way at all a grunge album. 34.788…% Complete needs mentioning because it was so drastic and unsuccessful a musical gambit. Inside The Torn Apart and From The Cradle To Enslave were blatant attempts at getting metal back into the charts. Evinta and Midnight In The Labyrinth typify a possible emerging trend of re-assessing older tracks as soundscapy, music-only type things.

The hardest thing to do would be to clarify why the likes of Elvis and Nick Drake are on there. Like, maybe Elvis influenced Blue Cheer, who influenced Rush, who influenced Metallica, who influenced every spotted grease oik ever, but then you’d have to go back further and analyse where ELVIS came from. Nile covered Holst on their first album – there’s a classical music offshoot right there. Nick Drake is a clear influence on Mike Akerfeldt, but by that token you’d have to include every influence for every successful act ever to merit its inclusion in the first place.

I’m spending a lot of time thinking about this at work but can’t bloody contact you from there, by the way, hence the lapse in comments.

Believe it or not, as a comics reader I struggle with something similar. In many cases you’re dealing with 50-70 years of history – getting a true handle on these characters is impossible, so finding a so-called ‘jumping on’ point is crucial. Picking up back issues and collections is a good way to plug the gaps, but will I ever have a full and comprehensive understanding of the history of Batman? I’m not sure it’s possible. The determination is admirable nonetheless, my main man. Keep it up.

This is a great list, props to you man! Alot of respect for actually acknowledging metalcore. You’re one of the few metalheads to actually understand that not all core is bad/it has had a huge impact on modern metal.

Also one of the few metalheads to realise that “just because you don’t like something doesn’t make it bad” type things. Again, props to you and one day I’ll get through this list

Also one more thing, I kinda consider Colors more of a progressive metalcore album. Mostly because what death metal bands really include clean vocals, melodies, and the amount of breakdowns (not a rediculous amount like modern metalcore) that the album has? Again though, that’s just me.

It’s clear that a good amount of effort was put into this, respect. Obviously there are quite a few albums I believe should have been included that were not, and to a lesser extent, albums that were included that should not have been, but I have no intention of complaining about any of that. Props for even attempting to create a comprehensive list that documents Metal’s history in full, even going back to Rock N Roll, Blues & Folk. A lot of albums I plan on checking out thanks to this. It’s a shame this list hasn’t gotten as much attention as it should have.

No, I haven’t. I don’t know much about Black Metal, and what all made it to the list so far have been suggested to me on forums I went to for help.
Cheers for the suggestions, I’ll look into all of those.

The only Black Metal album I own at all is Defending The Throne of Evil by Carpathian Forest. The genre’s a bit of a mystery to me at the minute. But I’m keen to learn.

A great list that comprehensively examines all the roots and influences of metal, including the blues which is so often forgotten about. However I know this will sound douchey, but I don’t think you need to understand metal, just enjoy it. That said your list is incredibly informative for showing how all these different genres have combined and rebounded with one another over the years. (except djent, djent sucks and deserves to die)

Yeah, I’d agree with you on that point. Nobody needs to understand it, sometimes its just fun to try.
Half of the reason I made the list was to try and get it straight in my own head, half of it was to get recommended some new music to try out. Ok. A third. Because the other third was just for something fun to do.

Hey there,
I feel that in the second to last section just after Meshuggah, the band Fellsilent should be mentioned as they were the band that then split to form Monuments and Tesseract, two very strong bands in the djent/prog scene. Personally I think they were one of the original ones at that point. Monuments could be mentioned as their EP was circling around around the time Periphery still was an online project, the two guitarists infact were very familiar with each other.

The two other bands I would suggest in that section would be Vildhjarta and then Uneven Structure.

Born of Osiris- The Discovery Album would be a good album, Trivium should definitely be on here too for sure in my opinion, also maybe August burns red, and although there was a decent section for metalcore I felt maybe one type of album was missing like Asking Alexandria or Memphis May Fire, where its kinda on the punky/post-hardcore side but has a lot of breakdowns and contains a lot of metal as well. Other miscellaneous possibilities Attila, For Today (for chrisian metal), Sevendust, Miss May I, and Chunk! No, Captain Chunk!. But damn good list man! Its hard to cover every single thing when there is so much out there

You probably chose Skinny Puppy’s worst album but it is the most indicative of metal other than Process. Surprisingly they still perform songs live from it to this day. I don’t get the Xandria and Pythia additions either. Goth metal that copied heavily from others? All gawth metal is mostly shite nowadays

The list isn’t a “Best Albums Ever” list, but rather a shortcut to a detailed knowledge of all metal in general. A lot of people, or a very vocal minority at least, have a narrow idea of what Metal is nowadays and that idea can usually be brought closer to the truth by listening to enough of the different types of Rock and Metal out there and understanding the relationships between each.

The list provides the Best albums but also some of the worst, and indeed some of the ‘meh’ albums. How do you know what most humans look like if you only see SuperModels or the Morbidly Obese? The middle-ground is also an important area to consider.

The list also provides non-metal albums with a strong relevance to metal, for better understanding of how they were implemented into Metal it may be useful to understand how they sound without any metal in them.

Again, I’m not forcing anyone to sit down and listen to them all, its just a tool for other nerds like me. It may allow someone to see something they fancy and give it a shot. I’m not an international magazine or syndicated TV show trying to claim they have the definitive description of what Metal is, just one lone nerd on the internet putting together a helpful little tool for fun and as one small nay-say to all the rude and negative fans out there who want to deny the vast scope Metal now covers and ignore many large and important parts of its heritage, history, influence and future just because, for example, it “seems cooler” to only like things that sound exactly like Slayer, or just because, for example, they didn’t personally enjoy much Nu Metal or Hair Metal.

This started off as a fun little project for me. It was a combination of a) wanting a list to give to myself in the past, a road-map to understanding it more clearly and b) an aspirational list of all the albums I’d like to have listened to some day.

I am happy for any constructive criticism, advice or help however. I’ve added literally over 200 albums to the list on the advice of people more informed than me. For example, I don’t like Black Metal much personally, so need to defer to the superior knowledge of bigger Black Metal fans and seek their help.

Just a quick question if you don’t mind; how did you find the list? I just started it for my little blog of about 10 followers, probably 8 of whom are personal friends from my real life. Since then its turned up on Periphery’s facebook and Dream Theater’s forum, as well as Japanese and German guitar forums I can’t even read. I’m just curious where its gone now. So; if its not rude of me can I inquire as to how and where you found it? Anywhere interesting?

What an excellent article; thoroughly enjoyed reading it. Just two minor points its Stampin’ Ground not Stompin’ Ground 8) and personally I think Ludichrist’s first album ‘Immaculate Deception’ was a fantastic example of the whole crossover genre (speed metal, hardcore, hip hop, jazz, blues) and Adrenalin OD’s ‘HumungousFungusAmongus’ was likewise a big influence on the thrash metal/hardcore crossover genres especially on Anthrax. Both worthy of a mention; but like I said minor points. The list was shared to me on FB by another music junkie; I’ve now shared it on my page for others to check out. Great job.

A very interesting article, I particularly like the connection to bands like Radiohead & Godspeed You! Black Emperor, whose influence on Prog metal is actually quite profound.
One criticism – those are easily the worst Cannibal Corpse albums to recommend. Tomb of the Mutilated is ok, but the Chris Barnes albums aren’t nearly as good as greats like Gallery of Suicide, Bloodthirst, Evisceration Plague etc. Vile & Wretched Spawn are not generally regarded to be the best examples of Corpsegrinder’s work. I realise this isn’t a list of the best albums ever, but for newcomers to the band there are better regarded albums to suggest.
Occult Rock albums deserve a mention. A relatively recent genre, it’s starting to pick up speed and popularity for bands like Ghost BC, Blood Ceremony, Jex Thoth, The Devil’s Blood & Uncle Acid & The Deadbeats is at an all time high. Basically takes 70”s psych & prog, mixes it with modern stoner doom sounds, a bit of folk, and tons of occult, mystical lyrics, often using hammond organs and fuzzed out production to enhance their sound. Definitely fit into the modern metal spectrum.
Also, there’s not much mention of the “New Wave of Traditional Heavy Metal”. It’s not necessarily a separate genre, but worth a mention for excellent olde tyme worshipping bands like Slough Feg, The Sword, In Solitude, Wolf, Argus, Christian Mistress, Dawnbringer etc. These bands don’t exactly fit with more epic power metal bands like Blind Guardian or Gamma Ray, as they have a more vintage sound and influence.
Otherwise, the albums and information that are here (aside from the CC ones) are mostly an excellent representation of metal and heavy rock. I do like how you’ve included some of metal’s less celebrated moments, as it’s important to look at failed experiments and just plain poor releases as well. You could add Entombed’s Same Difference, which is altogether an awful album in comparison with any of their other releases.
Good work!

This is really cool! Do you have this list in plain text format somewhere, or a spreadsheet or DB? I’d like to program something around this, but it would be nice if I didn’t have to regex your wordpress code.

I feel it’s necessary to point out that while it’s true that Lou Reed’s “MMM” wasn’t doing any chart topping, it’s an incredibly important piece of noise/drone music history as it’s one of the first records to bridge the gap between the minimalist composers like La Monte Young, Charlemagne Palestine and the rock world.

It’s definitely more noteworthy for its influence on music than for its critical “failure”, as it paved the way for the long-form repetition of drone metal bands like Earth, Nadja, Corrupted, Boris, Sunn O))).

I also think Thergothon’s “Stream From The Heavens” warrants inclusion as one of the first funeral doom records, along with Evoken’s “Shades of Night Descending” and Mournful Congregation’s “Weeping” – all top-tier funeral doom from the early 90s.

Also, Grief – we wouldn’t have half of the sludge bands we do today if not for “Come to Grief” or “Dismal”.

Hey, don’t know if anyone’s mentioned it before, and I haven’t counted the albums one by one:), but “Pig Destroyer – Terrifyer” is listed twice. Meaning there might be just 999 albums. Meaning the OCD pixie inside of me is freaking out right now. Help.

PS-awesome list. Been going through it one record at a time for over a year now, highly informative :) keep up the good work!

Heheh, alright, allow me to make a suggestion to replace the missing 1k, then – perhaps not a must-hear, but a damn good band nonetheless. http://bandcamp.com/tag/the-canyon-observer Local (Slovenian) post-metal, they’ll be at Bloodstock London, you should definitely check ‘em out if you’ll be in the neighbourhood.

Also, Noctiferia http://www.noctiferia.net/ They’re probably Slovenia’s most well-known metal band, been around for ages and no signs of slowing down. Started out black metal, they transitioned to djent/industrial in later years.

And did I mention Slovenia has a kick-ass metal festival, set in amazing nature and with incredibly welcoming locals? http://www.metaldays.net Seriously, come check it out and hit me up if you do, I’d be glad to give you a tour.

Oh and also it wouldn’t have hurt to include “Rum, Sodomy & the Lash” by the Pogues for punk (very influental!) and maybe “Xasthur – Nocturnal Poisoning” as an example for suicidal/depressive-Black Metal

I’d recommend both Bilo 3.0 by David Maxim Micic and Destiny Potato’s Lun for the djent section. Maybe you could replace Dream Theater’s A Dramatic Turn of Events for one of both. Nonetheless, great list! I’ve started listening to some of the early rock albums, and I hope to finish the list in 2 years or less haha.

Oooh, it’s not in there?
I’ll add it.
Lots of these albums get added and it doesn’t always save it. Or when you add new ones old ones get accidentally deleted. I wouldn’t be half surprised if Reign In Blood is missing or something at this stage.